


Familiar

by stainedglassflood



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell, Simon Snow & Related Fandoms
Genre: (but not the dog!! the dog does not die. some rats are eaten bc baz is an obligate carnivore), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Animal Death, But He'll Get Better, Emotional Support Animals, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Depression, M/M, Mildly Disordered Eating, Pre-Canon, Underage Drinking, Watford Fifth Year, [bad german accent] please help me i em starving for kompliments, awkward teenage vampires, dogs that look like their owners, except with swearing bc that's how fifteen year-olds talk, i think i'm making this sound heavier than it is, minor self-harm, not fangirl-era canon but aiming for those vibes, un-beta'ed (again), young baz is a snob
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-18
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2019-11-23 10:41:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18150797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stainedglassflood/pseuds/stainedglassflood
Summary: What with his cracking voice ruining his spellwork, the bloodstain on his collar that refused to come out, and the Mage's Heir mauling himself day and night in what he ominously referred to as 'weapons training', Basilton Pitch had enough to deal with. The last thing he needed was a stray dog hanging off his sleeve.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> started writing this to air out my brain with a different writing style after 6,000 arduous words of my other story. now exams are approaching and depression is really.... significantly weighing on me, so who knows when EITHER of them will be continued! ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯  
> i wasn't originally going to split this one into chapters, but i reached the end of this scene and thought. you know what. this is getting longer than planned. Why Not  
> also, i wasn't sure of how to categorise this. it's pre-snowbaz and unless my plan changes wildly, it'll stay that way, even though their relationship improves a LOT. but like... they're obviously endgame, in the grand scheme of things that this short story abt a dog doesn't encompass. do i tag their romance? do i not? i'm too tired to care

Crying, mused Basilton Pitch remotely as he scrubbed another damn tear from the bruise on his cheekbone, was pointless. Undignified. _Ignoble_. Quite possibly it had been invented to humiliate him – or people like him, at least. The sharpest, boldest, most learned magicians. The guardians of power. Some anarchic trickster god with a Robin Hood complex must have decided that it was all too much, and cursed them with running noses and facial spasms to teach them humility.

Baz sniffed, mouth crumpling, then clenched his jaw painfully back into that aloof look he was still trying to make as convincing as his father’s.

He did not intend to be taught.

It was enough that he still spent every day in a school run by a draconian _Guardian_ reader who thought his mother had been the Devil’s croquet partner. It was more than enough that he had to share his room with a self-righteous oaf who almost got the whole school blown up five times a week, and then blamed him for six. It was, frankly, rather heavy-handed that he was spending his evening hunched over in this foul, dingy, rot-reeking cavern, bloodstained and cursed and fucking flammable. A _Pitch._ _Flammable_. Just tasteless. He would have hoped that whichever Fate was in charge of injecting cruel irony into his life could have had a little more subtlety.

And this, right now – this was where he drew the line. As hateful as his affliction was, there was no reason for a fifteen year old to weep every time he had to kill a few rats. They were ugly, dirty little creatures, and they deserved ugly, dirty little deaths. Their panicked squeaks and that awful snap shouldn’t have felt like the worst part of his curse – if anything, he was doing the world a favour.

A tiny corpse stared accusingly at Baz from the floor, its head twisted round at a sickening angle. He buried his face in his arms.

He hadn’t meant for things to get messy tonight. (He never _meant_ for it to get messy; he was a monster, not an _animal_.) But he’d been tired, and agitated, and his jaw was bruised, and his night vision still blinked out at inopportune moments. So now there was blood on his hands. And all down his front. And in his _hair_. Even when he’d first done this three months ago, starving and terrified and cutting his lips on his fangs, he didn’t think he’d got blood in his hair. How would it get above his forehead?

He didn’t dare imagine what he looked like. Or what might happen if someone found him like this.

So, naturally, not thirty seconds after he thought that, something heavy barrelled into him from out of the dark.

Baz yelped, scrambling backwards, as Something scrabbled at his chest with blunt-clawed paws. He tried to push it off, but it jumped back up, shoving its snout in his face, a hairy, chaotic mess of long limbs and bad breath and lolling tongue-

Something licked Baz’s face, and he squawked indignantly.

It was a dog.

It got in a few more alarmingly enthusiastic licks before Baz managed to push it off, holding it at an arm’s length where it tried valiantly to slobber on his hands and forearms instead, its tail thumping against Baz’s foot.

“Bad dog- _bad!_ ” he managed, a little hoarsely. Its tall ears pricked up, but somehow between Baz’s mouth and the dog’s brain, the message seemed to become ‘I love you, please chew on my cuffs’. The dog accepted.

Baz stared at the animal, catching his breath. It wasn’t that it… _looked_ odd. It was an unusual breed, certainly, something dark and spindly and borzoi-ish that he hadn’t seen before, but there was nothing obviously wrong with its appearance. It _looked_ like a dog. But considering that it had come hurtling out of the dark of the catacombs and seemed very interested in having its mouth and yellowed teeth near him, he might have preferred if it had had a forked tail or glowing red eyes. This just made him wonder what it had to hide.

Normal animals didn’t like Baz. Cats hissed, rats fled, and four different horses had tried to throw him before his family had decided that perhaps riding wasn’t an essential life-skill after all. There was something very wrong with this dog.

Carefully, he extracted his unchewed arm from the dog’s fur, scratching its neck with the other as a distraction. Then he lit a fire in his palm and thrust it forward.

The dog yelped and disappeared.

Baz slumped back, winding the flame through his fingers automatically. So he’d been right, the dog was magickal. He was probably lucky that it hadn’t torn off his arm for that, but it felt anticlimactic somehow. At least an attack would have been a distraction.

He wondered for a second if he might have killed it - had its disappearance happened with a puff of smoke? - then dug his nails into the back of his neck and imagined his father’s coldest look. His stepmother’s most disappointed. His aunt’s most scornful.

It was a feral creature that lived down among the rats and the spiders and the decay. It was probably dark, and judging from the way it had trusted him, utterly stupid. And cowardly. And he didn’t even know if it was dead. He was _not_ going to cry over it.

Something wet poked at the hand on his neck, and he jumped and scrambled around.

The dog was standing behind him, ears pinned back.

With a hiss of frustration, he stood up and swept his fire in a circle, trying to drive it away. The dog skittered a few steps back, then vanished again. Baz sighed and let his fire go out, hand drifting back to his neck. A second later, something was pawing at the back of his legs.

He stepped away, only half turning this time, and gazed at it tiredly.

“What do you _want_?” he muttered. “I don’t have any food. Or… souls.”

The dog pawed at his leg again, then jumped up, claws catching on the shoulders of Baz’s red school jumper. Baz had always made a point of being tall for his age, but on its hind legs this dog was easily eye level with him. He did not approve.

He took hold of its paws, preparing to push it off again, but it had been investigating his face again and so when it whined, the sound – and its _breath_ – tickled horribly right in his ear. He squirmed and let go.

“Fine,” he muttered. “ _Fine_. If shoving your nose in my hair is that important to you, who am I to object? Certainly no-one compared to an undergrown hellhound that’s emerged from Crowley knows where to sniff out some shampoo it- _argh!_ ”

He recoiled, shoving the dog off again, and fell to his knees. He scrabbled in his jacket for his wand with the wrong hand, while the other clamped itself protectively over the shallow scratches on his neck. The broken, bleeding skin that this dog had just _licked_.

He gave up on his wand and made a few wild, undignified attempts to beat the dog back with his free arm, all of which were ducked. He screamed at it ( _get away, get_ away _, don’t you_ dare _-_ ), but his voice was weak and unstable, his throat raw. His shoulders shook, and he fell back, drawing his knees up to his chest in a ball.

His other hand found its way to his neck too, hovering over his scar.

The dog whined again, and turned in a tight circle, tail stiff between its legs, before padding softly back towards Baz.

Baz narrowed his eyes and looked away, chin tucked to his shoulder. Whatever this creature was, it didn’t seem violent, but he was not naive enough to let something slyly drink his blood just because it had big sad eyes. He knew how _that_ story ended. He would not be foolish enough to feel sorry for a monster.

The creature nudged him hesitantly, then pushed its way into his lap. He didn’t bother to stop it. He ignored it as it settled there, clumsily half-curled, as it looked up at him with its ears still folded back.

It nosed at the arm guarding his scar, and he stiffened, but it didn’t bite or pull it away. It just gave a few small, gentle, apologetic licks, then rested its head against him, a warm weight on the centre of his chest. The ache that took hold when he was upset and the cold that never quite seemed to leave any more receded slightly.

Baz looked at the dog out of the corner of his eye, mind whirring.

It _was_ still a dark creature. He wouldn’t trust it. Wouldn’t let his guard down. But he was one too now, every bit as unnatural and unsettling as it, and he was starting to remember having read something about pack animals licking each other’s wounds.

It was possible, he thought reluctantly, that this monster felt sorry for him.

And damn it, it was solid and warm and soft and friendly and sitting _right there_ in his lap. It had already found him, even tasted his blood – how much more damage could he really do?

He didn’t think that it would hurt when he laid a hand on its back and smoothed its long, wispy hair. And it didn’t seem like a risk when he pulled it into his arms and hid his face in its fur. Not when it was relaxing, ears straightening, tail whacking his foot again. It was just a dog, a stupid, cowardly, compassionate dog, a gangly, ghostly, kindly monster that for some reason seemed to care if he was hurting, and with it there, it almost didn’t feel like a failure when his chin trembled and he started once again to cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> final note: approximate appearance for Still Nameless Dog! basically a borzoi, but slightly more... wolfish? idk. [here](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/12/5d/ac/125dac4111274f9dc1769d9d2540757a.jpg) is a borzoi looking elegant, and [here](https://www.runtuffborzoi.com/uploads/3/7/8/7/3787902/6636425_orig.jpg) is one looking creepy. and for reference, they're genuinely [HUGE](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/2a/59/5d/2a595d4f5996d89afd9141b2ffa630ba--russian-wolfhound-dog-breeds.jpg)


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi again! a few things for this chapter:  
> -this story is turning out very baz-centric. simon and fiona WILL turn up, but... not for a while yet. fiona in particular will probably only be in a short epilogue.  
> -don't believe a word i say about herbs. i don't know a thing about actual witchcraft; i spent ten minutes on google then picked the ones with the coolest names.  
> -i've been a bit all over the place with projects recently, but i really am going to try and finish this story before i move on this time. it should only be two more chapters, plus an epilogue.  
> -thank you for reading! 🖤💜🖤

_Whilst scholars have yet to ascertain the precise nature of these spectres, there stands a long tradition, popular even amongst mundane peoples, of associating the canine with death. Indeed it is a rare society that does not fear glimpsing some form of the hell-hound in the dark, or else hearing a midnight howl heralding ruin-_

The library door slammed, and Baz stilled, staring through the worn hardback lying open in his hand. Most people wouldn’t dare do that in front of Mr Latimer (who remained convinced he was intimidating even though he looked withered enough to be put behind glass in his own Ancient and Fragile Books section), so either the Mage was out for blood, the school was under attack again, or-

“ _Simon!_ ” a voice hissed.

A second let out a gently disappointed sigh.

Baz closed his eyes for a second and tried to tune out the flustered whispering that followed (‘I didn’t mean to, Pen, it’s _heavy_ -’) as he considered what exactly he would do for one day – _one_ – without Snow.

A diversion, perhaps. A dead-end quest, a disaster the Heir could be blamed for, maybe even get him put in detention. Or better yet, the infirmary. (Oh, he could _hear_ Fiona cackling at that…)

Chimaeras had always seemed efficient to him.

A stern quavering drifted up over the balcony, and Baz drew back, out of sight of the ground floor, scanning for his place in his book. Normally he would relish seeing the Mage’s Heir get into trouble, even more so when Snow knew he was spectating, but the librarian’s incessant wheezing made his eardrums _itch_. And his hearing had always been sharp, but these last few years it had become… disturbing.

(Heartbeats from across a room. Toothless old men’s saliva. Sometimes _he_ felt like screaming whole buildings into silence.)

Mr Latimer’s voice faded. Baz took a breath, smoothed back his hair, and kept reading.

… _from Anubis overseeing funeral rites, to Kerberos at the gates of the Underworld; from the Cŵn Annwn on sinners’ heels, to Fenrir at the end of all things…_

Baz liked the library best when he was alone. It was calming, even comforting – almost forest-like with its tall, tight-packed shelves of dark wood and the lanterns and stained-glass skylights overhead. Sometimes he could find the same safe, secretive feeling that he’d had when hiding under his mother’s desk as a child. Unseen and unhunted and exactly where he belonged, like a dragon in a cave, or an owl in a hollow tree.

Unfortunately, Snow seemed to have decided that Baz being left alone could only lead to villainy, and so he, as Mage’s Heir, Prophesied Saviour, Witchfinder General, et cetera, had obviously had no choice but to spend much of the past month attempting to undermine Baz’s nefarious homework and violin lessons and cups of tea. And to give him several black eyes along the way.

Three sets of feet were padding up the main stairs, making a painfully obvious effort to be quiet. Baz ran a hand through his hair, tucked the book into his bag, and slipped away towards the back stairs without a sound.

*

The sun was setting as he crossed the courtyard to the White Chapel, glowing pink and amber on the bone-white stones. A crescent moon was rising, sharp edge still brushing the rooftops.

He knew the rest of the school was at dinner, but he couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder several times as he slipped inside. Between the white-eyed marble poets and the glass saints lit up in scarlet, the Chapel never failed to make him feel watched. ( _Seen_.) The skulls in the catacombs were worse.

He pulled his cape tighter around his shoulders, and started down the spiral stairs.

Hunting had got easier over the last year – in most senses. It was quicker and cleaner, at least, and he could now be almost certain that eating rats wasn’t going to poison him. And that _not_ eating rats for a day or two wasn’t going to kill him or turn him into a rabid, hollow-eyed, bloodthirsty monster. (Not immediately, anyway.)

But the longer he kept skipping meals or sneaking out in the middle of the night, the more certain he felt that someone was bound to realise soon.

(Snow had noticed, but he hadn’t _realised_ , not properly. He whispered about Baz and called him a monster because he would call him the Insidious Humdrum if he could get away with it. Not because he knew. Not because he had a shred of evidence to back up his accusations.)

Baz hunted quickly and drank quickly, eyes closed tight, then tossed the corpses aside and scrubbed the back of his hand over his lips. He had more than one reason to be down there that evening.

Flipping open his satchel, he took out a couple of library books he’d saved from the headmaster’s most recent purge, a pair of scissors, a handkerchief full of dried herbs, and a box of chalk liberated from Sir Bleakley’s classroom. He leafed briefly through the heavier of the books, cross-referencing a few symbols, then set them aside.

It wasn’t like he needed _instructions_ to construct a basic pentacle.

Humming a protective charm, he sharpened a piece of chalk with the edge of the scissors, and blew a ghostly cloud of dust from the tip. (The scissors bit his fingers, but it was worth it. Watching the shavings crumble into nothing gave him almost the same sort of vicious satisfaction as breaking things. Just… quieter.) He knelt and drew the circle and the star and the runes with a precise, practiced hand, then lit a flickering blue flame at each of the five points with his fingertip. The whole passage wavered as five new sets of faint, guttering shadows joined those cast by the torch he’d set into the wall, and he stood, glancing around just in case.

He wiped his hands on his trousers, leaving blurred, skeletal handprints on the dark grey fabric, tucked the herbs into his top pocket, and drew his wand.

‘ _ **Come out, come out, wherever you are**_ ,’ he cast quietly. Carefully. He could guide it with intent, but in practice, there was no knowing which of the monsters lurking down here the spell might summon.

He waited for a few breaths. Listened. Watched the flames dance and counted his heartbeats.

He’d chosen his position to better ambush something coming around the corner, but now that felt foolish. Obviously – _glaringly_ _–_ as long as the things couldn’t see him, he couldn’t see them either.

The stale wind sighed. No footsteps. No breath or heartbeat but his own.

‘ _ **Come out, come out**_ ,’ he whispered again. Then, eyeing the skulls on the opposite wall edgily, ‘ _ **Come back to haunt me**_.’

Something stirred behind the wall of bones. A shadow shifted, lengthened, shuddered for breath before starting to groan-

Blunt claws skidded over the floor of the tunnel. Snarling barks echoed through the narrow tunnel as a dark shape charged past Baz, and tripped over itself into the pentacle.

The flames around the pentacle flashed, spilling out to form a ring of blue fire. The shadow dissipated, and the dog in the fire stared at the wall, still growling.

‘It was just a wraith,’ Baz told it, crossing his arms. ‘I think you and I have more important matters to attend to right now.’

One of the dog’s ears pricked up, then pinned back again. It sniffed at the wall suspiciously.

 _Really?_ Baz rolled his eyes to the ceiling in despair, then stepped forward, into the dog’s line of vision. ‘ _Excuse_ me. It’s polite to listen when your summoner’s talking.’

The dog looked up, untensing slightly, then yelped as its nose brushed the flames. It turned one way, then the other, pawing at the lines of the pentacle, then back to face Baz, sitting down awkwardly and tucking its tail close over its paws.

‘Yes, thank you for noticing! Now-’ he cleared his throat. ‘My name is Tyrannus Pitch, and I have some questions for you.’

The dog cocked its head, watching him with wide black eyes. (There was just enough intelligence in its gaze to quiet the part of Baz that felt silly for talking to a creature. And to set off a rather more serious kind of unease.)

He pressed his lips together for a moment, squaring his shoulders, breathing in. He’d done more than enough research, but this part still had the potential to… not go as planned.

‘ _ **The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth**_ ,’ he said. (Clear vowels, sharp consonants. Unwavering. Pitches were _born_ with cut-glass elocution, and no nerves or hormones or Coven decrees could take that away.) ‘ _ **Speak now or forever hold your peace.**_ ’

He let the words linger in the air, eyes narrowed. His pulse drummed in his fingers, more insistent than usual but still agonisingly slow.

The dog opened its mouth, showing curved, vicious teeth and a long red tongue, and barked.

Baz set his jaw. His fangs had popped (from tension or frustration or still-precarious control, he couldn’t say) and he sucked his cheeks in around them. Not so hard it would draw blood. Just enough to hurt.

Rationally, he knew it was probably preferable for the creature to be incapable of speech. But he’d still hoped a little more would _happen_ after his first real use of banned magic. Something to cut through the restless ringing in his mind that hadn’t let up for a week.

(A fight. An earthquake. The Mage’s Men dragging him before the Coven and making him a martyr for the Families. _Anything_.)

Well. It wasn’t like Watford was lacking in danger. He could deal with one problem right now.

‘I know what you are,’ Baz told the dog, arms crossed, chin tilted at what he knew to be an exemplarily disdainful angle. (Snow had given him abundant opportunities to practice.) ‘I’ve read all about your kind.’

He wasn’t sure how much the creature could understand, but hearing his own voice always helped him feel in control. And the damn thing was just _sitting_ there, listening politely, when it should have been trembling with fear.

Baz curled his lip at it and stepped closer.

‘Soft fur, muddy paws, big sad eyes… It’s a reasonable likeness, I’ll grant you that. But there’s always something missing, isn’t there? Some way the forgery always falls short. _You_ , for example…’

The creature gazed at him. It was very still.

‘You don’t have a heartbeat.’ Baz stood as straight as he could. Clenched his fists to keep them from shaking. ‘You are not a dog. You are a thing that looks like a dog. And you have a _duty_.’

It tilted its head, one of its silky black ears flopping upside-down endearingly. Baz felt sick.

‘My name is Tyrannus Pitch,’ he said again. ‘This place is my birthright. This graveyard is my ancestors’, these tombs are my family-’ He looked away. Squeezed his fists, blinked hard, breathed in through his nose so his voice would steady. ‘You are a church grim. A guardian spirit. You’re meant to be protecting them from dark forces and evil and monsters, so-’

The dog got to its feet as Baz’s voice cracked. It pawed at the ground, like the flames were finally starting to worry it.

Baz let the flames flare up in its face, just to make it flinch. He was no less dangerous with a tremor in his voice, and he was _not_ going to cry.

One of his hands came up to grip the back of his neck, nails digging in.

‘ _So_ ,’ he continued, ‘While that ridiculous display with the wraith earlier proved you’re not completely ignorant of your duties, you’ve made a fairly unforgivable oversight.’ He stepped closer to the flames (too close) and knelt so he was at the creature’s eye level.

The dog ducked its head away from his gaze and whined. _Good_. It was finally catching on.

‘You’re meant to be hunting down monsters,’ Baz spat at it. His eyes were stinging, despite his best efforts. ‘So why the _fuc_ _k_ haven’t you tried to deal with me?’

The dog looked up at him, ears and tail twitching conflictedly, then poked its long snout at him over the flames.

Baz recoiled. And the dog disappeared.

‘ _Shit!_ ’ Baz whispered. _Stupid,_ stupid _, why hadn’t he checked it was bound, he hadn’t even_ _invoked_ _the creature formally so of course there was a chance-_

He clawed at his neck. Bit down hard on his lower lip.

He’d drawn the pentacle perfectly. Even as a trap, every source agreed it should have been more than adequate to cage a moderately powerful dark creature. This wasn’t a failure; it was a discovery. ‘ _Even considering their elusive reputation, Grims’_ _vanishing powers_ _are_ _significantly_ _more_ _formidable_ _than previously believed._ ’ He could write a bloody paper on it if he made it out of this with all his fingers intact.

Something cracked behind him, and he spun, fire flaring in each hand.

Delicate, pearl-like bones (Knuckles? Teeth?) were rolling over the stone floor, obviously knocked from their reliquary. A plague-brown rat was skittering out of the mess, out of the light. Baz flung one of his fireballs at it, then drew his wand and set the bones back in their place.

There was a whisper of wind, a rainy-earth smell, then the grim was next to him again, hackles raised and barking. (Not at him, of course. True to character, it had taken it upon itself to scare off the very charred, very _dead_ rat.)

‘It’s fine,’ Baz snapped. (As well as he could snap while swallowing his heartbeat.) ‘It’s dealt with. Even you can’t be stupid enough to think that thing is going to bother anyone else.’

The dog whined.

Tail tense and twitching, it padded hesitantly over to the rat, and gave a low bark. When it didn’t respond, the dog whined again – almost whimpered – and darted closer to nose at it. Some of the soot crumbled with a sick little crunch.

Baz tugged his cloak tighter and looked away.

 _It was just a rat_ , he told himself. _It was just a rat,_ _i_ _t was just–_

He choked, and tears finally fell from his treacherous, burning eyes.

 _Just_ _a filthy little rat._

The dog was barking again. Paws scuffling. Running aimless little circles around the tunnel, like it was looking for something. Or demanding he fix something.

 _Please_ , Baz thought at it, _**please**_ _do not tell me you’re the only grave-guardian in existence who can’t understand the concept of death._

He collapsed against the wall, sliding to the floor, and hugged both arms over his head. His shoulders were shaking now, his breath gasping – it was pitiful. He was a pitiful sight.

Padding footsteps approached him. A cold snout nudged at him, then licked his hand.

‘No,’ he told it, without much force.

A little more scuffling, then the dog was back, poking more insistently.

‘ _No_.’

It pushed one of his hands down with a paw, and placed something on his knee. Something small and soft and withered, with a sad, dusty smell like cheap furs in a curiosity shop. Baz started to push it away, then froze.

It was a rat. Dead and drained.

Baz scrambled back, heart shuddering. The dog barked at him. It looked expectant.

‘ _No!’_ he shouted, dragging his hand over the wall as he backed away, trying to banish the feeling. ‘No, absolutely fucking not – wh- whatever you want me to do with that… do it yourself.’ His voice had dropped to a whisper, dark and fearful.

The dog picked up the rat gently, like a puppy, and scrabbled at the ground like it was burying a bone, then set it down again. Eyes wide, it looked up at him again, and whined.

‘No, no, no…’ Baz was backing away, skirting around the still-burning pentacle.

The dog bounded after him, licked at his hand, tugged at his sleeve. He shoved it away, hard, and it blinked out before it could fall in the flames.

And then there it was again, sad-eyed and imploring, on his other side.

‘Just leave me alone!’ Baz screamed. ‘I don’t want you! No-one wants you! Why would you even try? Don’t you know what you _are_?’

It jumped up at him, trying to lick his face again like he was some helpless crying puppy.

He ducked away, then tore the bundle of herbs out of his pocket and flung them at the creature, hoping to ward it off. ‘Get _away_ , you filthy scavenger!’

The herbs just fluttered past it to the floor.

A few dry leaves and pressed flowers fell into the flames, and flared red, burning away into aimless magical smoke. (Wild wormwood for bravery, devil’s nettle for protection, St Joseph’s wort to honour the dead. _Wasted_. All wasted on the soulless things down here.)

Baz snatched the torch off the wall, swept his things into his bag with his wand, and wiped his teary cheek on his shoulder. The dog was still watching him, hesitant again, scratching at the ground with its blunt black claws. He avoided its gaze and put the fire in the pentacle out, whispering, ‘ _ **Make a wish**_.’

Then he turned his back and walked away through the dark.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter was supposed to have two scenes and be twice as long but i'm depressed as all hell and haven't written in months so............... this is all you get lol  
> (it will happen. i just need... a *lot* of time)  
> also you should know that neither this, nor any of my other work, will ever acknowledge wayward son in any capacity. even worldbuilding. what are you talking about, vampires aren't /immortal/. my city now

Baz ached.

The pains had been discrete, at first: The dark thudding of a headache. The pulse and sting where his knuckles had split. The cold knife of hunger in his abdomen, bleeding slowly through his veins. But now, after a month with Snow on his heels and several long hours in a draughty classroom writing _lines_ like a twelve-year-old and feeling the back of his neck prickle as Snow’s staticky magic slowly built up, it was just this. Just one demanding, devouring _ache_.

Pitches didn’t bow to pain. Pitches were fearless, unbreakable, eternal. (Until, of course, they weren’t.)

Baz gazed at the ink drying on his page, spinning his pen between his fingers, then laced his fingers together and cracked his knuckles dramatically. The silence broke like ice. (As did his scabs, but it was worth it.)

Snow spun in his seat, eyes wide, then glared at him heroically and slumped back on his desk. The Minotaur – supervising detention as the Mage’s favourite henchman – huffed disapprovingly and shuffled his papers, but didn’t say anything. (There was nothing he could say. Baz was an expert on getting under people’s skin without ever breaking a rule.)

Baz smirked to himself and started on his next line.

It was those little pleasures that made life worth living. Or undeath worth enduring. The next ten minutes worth sitting through without burning anything down. And the next ten. And the next.

(He was fast becoming an expert on fighting back an ever-growing list of impulses much worse than just making Snow cry.)

Granted, he hadn’t been exercising much impulse control when he’d sneaked up the Weeping Tower last night, but that was hardly his fault. He’d been tired (always tired), and reckless, and sentimental, and how was he supposed to make rational decisions when his insufferable roommate wouldn’t even let him _sleep_ without bombarding him with questions about his activities and whereabouts and supposed Doomsday plans?

He’d just wanted a moment to himself. One moment of peace. No hounds or heroes or monsters hunting him down. And that stairwell had seemed so welcoming, by starlight and torchlight and gentle blue shadows. So familiar. Drawing him in like the tide, like the strong arms of a parent welcoming him home.

(He probably should have allowed himself more than blood and wine that day, but it was hard enough sneaking _those_ past Snow. Real food was a luxury and a headache, and sometimes it just didn’t seem worth the trouble.)

(Besides. Sometimes he didn’t _want_ to be thinking clearly.)

It had seemed like such a good idea. And even if it hadn’t, he’d _wanted_ it. Like a rabbit wants to run, like a fire wants to burn.

The tower was so beautiful: graceful arched windows, engravings glowing with power, rich dark wood worn smooth by his ancestors’ hands. It was so _right_ for him to be there. The door to the headmistress’s chambers – to _home_ – had swung open at his softest touch.

And then, of course, the illusion had shattered.

He was almost glad Snow had followed him. He would likely have found himself vomiting rat blood on his mother’s antique carpets if he hadn’t had someone to punch.

(Her carpets were still _there_. The Mage had kept all her things. Baz hated the thought of that man touching them almost as much as he hated the thought of them being thrown away.)

(It didn’t even look like he’d _been_ touching them. They’d just been _left_ – kept to keep her family from having them. Art and knowledge and history gathering dust while the Mage tore her legacy from the heart of the school.)

So Snow had barged in, swinging his blade about carelessly and shouting about _monsters_ and _tyrants_ and _dark magicians_ , and Baz had hexed the Sword of Mages right out of his barbarous hands. And they’d fought – their third fistfight in as many days – and somehow between blows it had gone from just another of a hundred scuffles, to Snow lying crumpled halfway down the stairs.

(He was _fine_ – he hadn’t even broken any bones. But when the Mage’s Heir ran crying to his master, Basilton Pitch suffered for it. _Sic semper Tyrannis._ )

A drop of blood ran down Baz’s little finger to his paper. He chewed the inside of his cheek, wrapped his handkerchief around his knuckles, and kept writing.

The task itself wasn’t unbearable: the Minotaur had him copying out the full version of the Watford rules, which had only been lightly amended since the 1570s and, as a piece of history, could almost be called interesting. (Almost.) But being stuck here over dinnertime – and being trapped with Snow _agai_ _n_ – seemed an almost calculated guarantee that he would remain exactly as agitated as he’d been at the start of all this. It would be the Mage’s own damn fault if Baz found himself with no choice but to reoffend.

(He _would_. He’d do it again, to hell with the consequences, and to hell with anyone expected less of him.)

(Well – he’d take on Snow again, at least. As many times as it took to drive the usurpers out. But he wasn’t sure he could bring himself to see his mother’s office desecrated once more.)

(He hadn’t even told Fiona he could still get in yet. She’d only ask him to go back.)

Baz turned over his fourth sheet of paper and rubbed his neck, scanning the room through narrowed eyes without raising his head. The sky outside was a deep, velvety indigo. Snow seemed to have given up on his task entirely, and lay slumped over his desk, face hidden in his forearms. The Minotaur’s coffee had gone cold.

 _Not much longer_ , he told his hunger, even though he hated to speak to that side of himself. _Patience. Breathe – but not too deeply. Not much longer now._

The hunger tugged a cold, resentful claw through the bottom of his ribcage, but didn’t challenge him.

The Minotaur took a gulp of coffee with a grimace, let out a long, snuffling sigh through his bovine nostrils and shuffled his papers importantly. Both Baz and Snow’s heads snapped up.

‘I have-’ (he coughed) ‘-a… meeting to attend. Ought not to be more than seven minutes. I expect your exercises to be complete and on my desk by the time I return.’ And he clutched his scattered jumble of papers to his chest, scooped his empty mug up with a horn, and bustled out.

Baz watched the door intently, listening to his heavy footsteps fade, and counted to five. Then he leapt up, tucking his chair in neatly, and sprang over the Minotaur’s abandoned desk to search the cabinets behind it.

‘Oi!’ Snow barked.

Baz ignored him and kept flipping the drawers open, one by one. (Not even locked. How considerate.)

Snow pushed out of his chair and stomped over, grabbing at Baz’s shoulder. ‘The _fuck_ are you doing?’

Baz slipped out of his grip and turned. ‘Retrieving these.’ He held up their two confiscated wands: one engraved and polished ivory, one crudely carved from bone. (Snow snatched for them, and Baz held them above his head.) ‘And if you’re _very good_ and don’t get in my way, I might even let you have yours back.’

Snow stared at him. ‘You can’t- we’re still- I’ll tell Mr Minos. You’re not allowed to leave yet.’

Baz rolled his eyes despairingly. ‘Really. You _actually_ believe he’s coming back.’

‘He has a meeting! And you’re, you still have to… This can’t be _it_ for you! You tried to kill me!’

‘Hearsay,’ Baz said, stepping around the desk. ‘You have no evidence of my motives, or that it were even intentional at all.’

Snow shoved in front of him, blocking the exit. ‘You admitted it! _You said_ you pushed me down the stairs!’

‘Under extenuating circumstances, and even, I feared, threat to my life.’ Baz twisted his face in mock-distress, and let his wand fall lightly into his roommate’s chest. ‘This whole _righteous gangster_ act of yours would never hold up in court.’

‘We’re not _in_ court,’ Snow growled (because of course, once he’d dug in his heels he would do anything not to be moved.) ‘We’re at war. Against _you_. I’m not giving you free run of the school just like that.’

His jaw was pushed forward, making all the lines of his face and neck strong and square and smooth. His blue eyes were aflame with earnest fury.

Baz pressed the tip of his wand into a rib he knew was bruised, and flashed his most untouchable Pitch sneer. (Sharp teeth. Blue blood. Fire.) ‘I’d like to see you stop me.’

They glared at each other, heartbeats rising and eyes locked, as smoke thrummed through the room and Baz’s bruised mind whirred – _A hex?_ _A_ _punch? How will he come at me – my face, my hands, my neck?_ – until a shriek split through the window from the courtyard.

Snow’s eyes widened, heroic impulses flitting across his infuriating freckled face, and he let his attention slip for a split second too long. Baz whipped past him, flinging the spare wand through the open window as he went, and bolted out of the door.


End file.
